This appears to be an extension of the carrier billing feature Facebook revealed in June.

Bango is providing Facebook with mobile web carrier billing in the US, the UK and Germany, with more countries to come throughout the rest of the year. The offering enables Facebook users to purchase digital content without the use of premium SMS messages or “the limitations of credit cards”.

“App stores, publishers and content providers use Bango to collect payment from mobile users for online content and services,” says Bango. “Bango’s pervasive presence across app stores, publishers and mobile operators creates a platform effect for its partners, leading to more identified mobile users and maximizing the number of single-click payments. The result is significantly higher rates of collection. This is the experience that Facebook is now using for its smartphone payments service on the mobile web.”

“Conventional operator billing is expected to achieve around a 40% conversion rate,” the company says. “Put simply, most mobile commerce customers who click ‘buy’ do not successfully buy. Billing with the Bango payment platform delivers an average conversion rate of 77%. Most users who click ‘buy’, do buy.”

Bango’s offerings are already in use by Google Play, Blackberry App World and Opera Mobile Store. Soon, it will provide payment services to Amazon as well.

What’s with the highly proprietary partnership with mobile payment providers? They give less options to consumers. I wish this stops this a work with other mobile providers like mPowa (www.mpowa.com), Sail, iZettle, etc.